1. Does it not feel like this year is the year ESPECIALLY that everyone goes crazy with spring training stats. It will be one of these two scenarios - Royals doing well “NEW COACHES HAVE EVERYTHING FIXED”. Or Royals struggle “NEW COACHES HAVEN’T FIXED ANYTHING”. I can just see it especially this year with all the new faces on the coaching staff. Lol.
2. Keller……I get it. I hope for the best with him. I know we want to dog the old coaches…but some things fall on the player. Keller doesn’t get a pass for not knowing about analytics before this offseason. He was more than capable to go to Driveline before the offseason before he hits the open market. Yes, a lot on the Royals, but dude….Driveline has been around for a while now. You don’t get a pass from me for being ignorant…or not working to get better until literally the season before you become a free agent.
3. Arbitration…..I don’t get it from the teams prospective. I just don’t get why you possibly piss off Singer, Burnes….whoever over what amounts to peanuts. I hope it doesn’t hurt the Royals chances with Singer, but he hasn’t signed a long term deal yet….so it certainly didn’t help. It’s bad business, I don’t get why they don’t see it. It’s not just the Royals….all teams….its bad business.
"Matt Beaty is an infielder." He can get on base, or he has in the past. He has hit for power in the past. It seems like last year was a wash for him, but he is certainly able to be better than Hunter Dozier, though that is a LOW bar to get over.
Are we just sleeping on the idea that Beaty can be better than Carmago and Duffy? Looking at their respective Baseball Reference pages, I think Beaty would have a better shot at being productive for the team, at least on the offensive end than any of the others. Is his defense that bad, or is Carmago's that good?
David - a few years back I heard Brian Bannister offer another reason why spring training numbers can be so deceiving: often in a particular outing or in multiple outings, pitchers are working on one specific pitch and so they throw it far more often than they would in a real game, which of course can distort their statistics.
Further, batters are often quick to pick up on that so they know what pitch is likely coming or at least what to look for. And that of course distorts their stats as well.
We would all be well-advised to remember that spring training games may look like real regular-season baseball, but quite often they're really not.
I love the love for Eaton! Yeah, it was limited, but that limited time had him as probably the 3-4th player on the team depending on what you value the most! But the thing I appreciated most about him was he provided DITRH - diamond in the rough hope! Kinda like Colin Snider at the beginning of the year. We all expect BWJ, Melendez, Gavin and some others to be home runs... BUT with swing and misses as bad as Crow, Zimmer, Starling, Dozier (hoping he doesn't stay on this list) some unexpected hits like a Vinnie and Nate are just what the Dr ordered for this fan! If we could get unexpected finds and legitimate big leaguers in Vinnie and Nate - that's over 20% of the lineup. Throw in Salvy, Melendez, BWJ, now over half the lineup is legit!
The Keller article - when I read that line I thought "damn, it was that bad?" I mean the whole moneyball thing started at least two decades ago and our Royals aren't 'that interested' in analytics. Okay then...
I know it's early, but I'd like to hear your opinion on the changes, additions and improvements the pitchers have made. In the sense that from what I've heard, a lot of it has been initiated by the pitcher. We've heard from Lynch and Keller that what they were thinking needed to be done was re-enforced by the staff. Not that the staff insisted they do this or throw that. This really makes one wonder if this has been happening the last several seasons. And if it has, it makes one wonder if those changes were snuffed out by the previous staff (ie you need better fastball command before we worry about throwing that pitch). Just something I've been thinking about and piecing together the more we've heard from pitchers and staff.
Couple thoughts on todays article. :)
1. Does it not feel like this year is the year ESPECIALLY that everyone goes crazy with spring training stats. It will be one of these two scenarios - Royals doing well “NEW COACHES HAVE EVERYTHING FIXED”. Or Royals struggle “NEW COACHES HAVEN’T FIXED ANYTHING”. I can just see it especially this year with all the new faces on the coaching staff. Lol.
2. Keller……I get it. I hope for the best with him. I know we want to dog the old coaches…but some things fall on the player. Keller doesn’t get a pass for not knowing about analytics before this offseason. He was more than capable to go to Driveline before the offseason before he hits the open market. Yes, a lot on the Royals, but dude….Driveline has been around for a while now. You don’t get a pass from me for being ignorant…or not working to get better until literally the season before you become a free agent.
3. Arbitration…..I don’t get it from the teams prospective. I just don’t get why you possibly piss off Singer, Burnes….whoever over what amounts to peanuts. I hope it doesn’t hurt the Royals chances with Singer, but he hasn’t signed a long term deal yet….so it certainly didn’t help. It’s bad business, I don’t get why they don’t see it. It’s not just the Royals….all teams….its bad business.
Eaton also had 11 SB’s in that limited playing time. I’d love to see what he could do over a full season.
"Matt Beaty is an infielder." He can get on base, or he has in the past. He has hit for power in the past. It seems like last year was a wash for him, but he is certainly able to be better than Hunter Dozier, though that is a LOW bar to get over.
Are we just sleeping on the idea that Beaty can be better than Carmago and Duffy? Looking at their respective Baseball Reference pages, I think Beaty would have a better shot at being productive for the team, at least on the offensive end than any of the others. Is his defense that bad, or is Carmago's that good?
David - a few years back I heard Brian Bannister offer another reason why spring training numbers can be so deceiving: often in a particular outing or in multiple outings, pitchers are working on one specific pitch and so they throw it far more often than they would in a real game, which of course can distort their statistics.
Further, batters are often quick to pick up on that so they know what pitch is likely coming or at least what to look for. And that of course distorts their stats as well.
We would all be well-advised to remember that spring training games may look like real regular-season baseball, but quite often they're really not.
I love the love for Eaton! Yeah, it was limited, but that limited time had him as probably the 3-4th player on the team depending on what you value the most! But the thing I appreciated most about him was he provided DITRH - diamond in the rough hope! Kinda like Colin Snider at the beginning of the year. We all expect BWJ, Melendez, Gavin and some others to be home runs... BUT with swing and misses as bad as Crow, Zimmer, Starling, Dozier (hoping he doesn't stay on this list) some unexpected hits like a Vinnie and Nate are just what the Dr ordered for this fan! If we could get unexpected finds and legitimate big leaguers in Vinnie and Nate - that's over 20% of the lineup. Throw in Salvy, Melendez, BWJ, now over half the lineup is legit!
The Keller article - when I read that line I thought "damn, it was that bad?" I mean the whole moneyball thing started at least two decades ago and our Royals aren't 'that interested' in analytics. Okay then...
Good work as usual Lesky
I know it's early, but I'd like to hear your opinion on the changes, additions and improvements the pitchers have made. In the sense that from what I've heard, a lot of it has been initiated by the pitcher. We've heard from Lynch and Keller that what they were thinking needed to be done was re-enforced by the staff. Not that the staff insisted they do this or throw that. This really makes one wonder if this has been happening the last several seasons. And if it has, it makes one wonder if those changes were snuffed out by the previous staff (ie you need better fastball command before we worry about throwing that pitch). Just something I've been thinking about and piecing together the more we've heard from pitchers and staff.